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Chapter 22
Fang Jingxing’s eyes shined. “It’s him.”
The Diviner had not seen his own portrait for ages. He looked at his portrait for a long time and felt sorry for himself. To his visitors, he narrated a full account of how he step by step courted death by refining those concoctions.
He most likely also felt he appeared too unreliable, so he consoled them with a voice ruined by certain illegal drug usage. “Don’t look at me like this. My divinations are still very magnificent.”
King Flying Bird was very frank. “I don’t believe you.”
Squeezing Purple: “There’s nothing that can be done about no belief; the gate-watching uncle chose the Diviner.”
Careless Magnificence: “I suspect there has been some kind of filthy deal between them.”
Most Beautiful Royal We: “Yeah……don’t tell me he is uncle’s old paramour?”
“Whether it is his old paramour, I do not know.” Fang Jingxing sized up the Diviner’s august countenance and commented, “According to this plot’s style, I guess the prerequisite to give us a divination might be to help cure him.”
King Flying Bird also looked at him at the same time. “……Whatcha say?”
Fang Jingxing said, “He presented his entire body of injuries. It should have significance to him.”
King Flying Bird struggled to think about an argument. He then saw the Diviner at last lay down the portrait with reluctance.
The group of people immediately tensed up, their breathing coming to a halt. They listened to the Diviner’s hoarse voice say, “It is possible for me to help you divine for someone’s location, but I have a condition.”
King Flying Bird and co did not utter a word.
Jiang Chen widened his eyes slightly.
The Diviner announced, “I want to regain my previous appearance. Nowadays, my ability to walk is compromised and not suitable for traveling far. You all go look for the medicinal ingredients I am lacking, and I will help you divine.”
King Flying Bird and co voiced “Oh”s and thought it was not bad.
For many story missions, players had to help NPCs find things. The hidden plot would at most be a bit troublesome. This was nothing.
On Jiang Chen’s side, the system automatically gave an answer. “Okay, what medicinal ingredients?”
The Diviner happily honked out a laugh. He fished out a list from a drawer and handed it to them.
They grasped the paper and took a look, discovering a densely packed list. Nevermind there being a dozen or more medicinal ingredients, the more further down an ingredient was on the list, the more difficult it was to find. They were afraid they would be running around almost the entire map.
The Diviner continued rejoicing and reminded, “There’s one more on the back. This is of utmost importance; don’t leak it.”
They heard what was said and turned the paper over. On the back, as if scrawled by a dog, was: Tooth of Redstripe Lion King.
This was the final straw that broke the camel’s back.
King Flying Bird’s rationality “popped” like a string breaking. He used on the Diviner the line his father would frequently use to verbally attack him. “Why don’t you fucking die?!”
Jiang Chen was also a bit disgusted by this long list of names, but to this final item, he did not have too large a reaction.
After thirty years, the game had added countless things. Although he had read the material prior to the official server launch, the main points he paid attention to were the unfamiliar professions, arena, bounty wall, as well as several instances. It was impossible for him to read all the new monsters that had been added.
He asked, “This is very difficult?”
King Flying Bird and co looked at him in surprise. “Boss, you have not played Wandering Dream before ah?”
Jiang Chen did not utter a word.
To Fang Jingxing, he was willing to stingily give a truthful response as the other’s elder; but his body and mentality were, in the end, both youthful, so he was unwilling to acknowledge himself as the “elder” of these youngsters.
In the closed beta, Fang Jingxing had tested whether he had previously played before and answered, “Redstripe Lion King is the strongest wild boss.”
King Flying Bird added, “In addition, it is a max level monster!”
Squeezing Purple: “Redstripe Lions are actually not difficult to beat, but their Lion King is truly super-difficult to fight.”
Most Beautiful Royal We: “Ordinarily, a team needs to hit it together; it is undefeatable by oneself.”
Squeezing Purple: “It can still be beaten. Captain Fang once live broadcasted him solo-killing it.”
King Flying Bird and co spoke with different mouths but the same voice: “Are you treating us as Fang Jingxing ah?!”
Escape Empath swept a glance over his friends and echoed with a smile, “Precisely, you treat us as Fang Jingxing ah.”
Careless Magnificence said, “We now have only one Level 40, with the rest all being within the Level 30s range. The Lion King is maxed at Level 99. We need everyone to have Fang Jingxing’s level of skill to have even an iota of hope at killing it.”
He looked at the bosses. “Speaking of which, it is not a wild map boss, but enjoys the reputation of a wild map boss. Every time a server experiences a first kill, the system will give an announcement.”
Thinking for a moment, he still felt it was not enough and asked, “Boss, do you know Wandering Dream’s bounty wall?”
Jiang Chen nodded.
Bounty Wall existed previously. Although there were a plethora of things added since then, he was not unfamiliar with it.
Careless Magnificence said, “The Lion King’s strength is a five-star difficulty on the individual bounty wall.”
Jiang Chen voiced, “Oh.”
With that said, his heart had a general idea of how things exactly stood.
When Careless Magnificence heard this neither salty nor light[1] “oh” sound, he did not know whether to laugh or cry.
What he had just said was said in vain. Boss had not played Wandering Dream before, nevermind hitting the Lion King. No matter how they described it, it would be useless. Let him hit it once to understand how terrible it was.
He had no better option but to say, “In short, this Lion King cannot be hit by us at the present stage. There are also a few other unbearable ones among the rest because they are drops from max level monsters. Let’s first find everything we can find.”
Jiang Chen once again examined this list of items, inwardly chanting within his heart that he would not take the life of a living creature. He then put it away.
The Diviner saw him put it away and once again honked in laughter, even happier. He leisurely raised a finger. “Those were the medicinal ingredients I need for one of my injuries.”
Party of seven: “……”
The Diviner took out a second piece of paper from the drawer, upon which was another list of items. He smiled and said, “For another injury of mine, these are……”
Jiang Chen did not finish listening and walked over with a cold expression, kicking him in the leg.
Unfortunately, the NPC could not be moved by a kick this time. The Diviner was not affected even the slightest bit and continued to speak with a voice akin to a broken gong: “the medicinal ingredients needed.”
He reached out a hand, waiting for them to take it.
King Flying Bird and co’s complexions momentarily worsened.
Didn’t this fucking thing just say he had several injuries? A list of items for each, wasn’t this making them search until the end of time?!
Fang Jingxing pondered for a moment. “I feel……”
He had yet to finish speaking these words when Jiang Chen directly opened vendetta.
The seal talisman sharply flew forward. That Diviner’s fully wrinkled face instantly spouted blood.
King Flying Bird and co were shocked. “Holy shit!”
Within the game, some NPCs could not be hit; no matter how they were attacked, not a hair on their body would be damaged.
Meanwhile, some could be hit. For example, the city militia guards of the main city; if players took the initiative to attack them, they would immediately respond to an assault by killing the assailants. The blood bars of NPCs were thick, and their attacks were high. Fighting them was simply bearing hardships without getting the desired outcome. Moreover, there were no rewards to be gained.
This NPC before their eyes could bleed, which meant he would definitely counterattack.
Sure enough, the Diviner with his bloody face was stunned for two seconds before immediately slapping the table and standing up. He screeched, “Let I, your father, send you to death!”
Jiang Chen’s seal talisman accurately smacked his mouth.
The Diviner had just moved forward half a step before another mouthful of blood spurted out past his lips. He looked even more miserable.
King Flying Bird and co were dumbstruck.
Fang Jingxing followed suit and opened vendetta, throwing a dark curse over. The Diviner’s entire body began emitting black smoke.
King Flying Bird and co once again exclaimed, “Holy shit.” They watched the Diviner dash forward, only then regaining their spirits as he neared close. One after another, they also opened vendetta, preparing to lie down together.
Who would have thought that after five minutes of fighting, an “ao” broke out of the Diviner’s throat as he was thrown onto the street.
Afterward, he wailed endlessly as he crawled up, trembling as he nestled back into the chair. He retrieved the second list. “Okay, okay, then just one list of items is fine.”
King Flying Bird and co: “???”
What the fuck, it could still be played like this?
They were silent for a moment. Not waiting for the boss to say anything, they dashed forward and rubbed him against the ground again.
However, this time was useless. The Diviner wailed like ghosts and howled like wolves, but did not relent. Collapsing, he said, “No more discussing, if you’re unwilling, get lost. I will not help you find the person!”
King Flying Bird and co regretfully laid down their weapons and looked at the two bosses. “It’s like this?”
Fang Jingxing said with a smile, “En, didn’t he originally say he wanted to regain his appearance? This should be his bottom line. This list of items most likely treats his face.”
The party of seven then left the wooden house.
Careless Magnificence and the others slowly regained their senses and couldn’t help but blow rainbow farts[2] for the bosses.
The hidden plot was composed of layers upon layers of difficulty. The previous NPC could be moved by a kick, which was surely giving a hint to the players that the regular methods used to deal with the story were insufficient. This time, although the NPC could not be moved by a kick, they could still try to open vendetta. How could they have expected this?!
The bosses deserved to be the ones to discover the hidden plot!
Squeezing Purple: “I finally know why that plot from the closed beta was not cleared after over twenty days.”
Most Beautiful Royal We: “Too much following the compass and going with the set square.”[3]
Careless Magnificence: “No understanding about being flexible.”
King Flying Bird had yet to understand the tricks, but he felt these two were really awesome and echoed, “Right, right, right!”
Escape Empath laughed and did not interrupt. He opened the taskbar to look at the list of items.
Jiang Chen heard their incessant boasts and stated, unperturbed, “No, I just wanted to hit him.”
He indeed had a slightly vague guess. As soon as Fang Jingxing spoke, he then knew they both had thought of the same thing.
But this was only a small factor; the main reason was just his desire to take the life of a living creature. The Diviner made himself that way, yet he wanted them to pay the bill. His demeanor was too cheap. Jiang Chen had to beat him to become at ease.
While he walked over to the teleportation formation, he also looked over the list, thinking about hiring people to find them.
His account was linked to his dad’s bank card. On that card was his own money.
The money earned from competing was relatively small, while the gains from live broadcasting was in excess. The card held millions, and over the last thirty years, the money had birthed more money, increasing significantly. When his dad heard he was playing the game, he linked it to the bank card and deposited half a million of his earned money onto it. At the moment, buying materials was also not expensive, so the venture was completely affordable.
Just as this idea rose, he saw a loudspeaker appear in the channel.
Escape Empath had picked out everything that could be collected at the present stage and offered a high price to all the servers.
He said with a smile, “Let’s go and think of means to collect the remaining few materials.”
The guild members were all used to this style of his and obediently followed him.
Upon seeing this, Jiang Chen did not act unreasonable and entered the teleportation formation.
The remaining materials were all relatively difficult to obtain. They spent the entire afternoon fighting in order to obtain just one.
Jiang Chen went offline as usual and came back at seven o’clock at night. He saw that Fang Jingxing had led them during this time to kill a max level monster, obtaining a new material. He was instantly pleased.
Running missions were dry-as-dust and dull, so they found the time to hit instances, which adjusted their moods.
Three days later, they only had the Redstripe Lion King’s Tooth left to obtain.
King Flying Bird said, “There really is nothing to be done about this. We can only raise our levels.”
Fang Jingxing examined the map and then looked at the Seal Master. “Take a look at that summoning token.”
Jiang Chen said, “There are no written limits about its usage.”
Fang Jingxing heard him speak like this and knew the other’s mind had also progressed similarly to his. He smiled at King Flying Bird and the others, saying, “Actually, we can attempt to fight it.”
King Flying Bird and co did not have the slightest bit of faith. “How can it be fought?”
Fang Jingxing said, “I’ll explain when I come back. I have something to deal with and will chat in the evening.”
He left the game running and went offline, heading straight for the airport. He received the Film Emperor Xie Chengyan, who had returned from work.
The two of them did not eat dinner outside, instead heading to the Xie household. Xie Chengyan took the other to his bedroom and picked up the eyeglasses from the bedside cabinet. He asked, “What did the characters and symbols look like?”
Fang Jingxing said, “There are numbers, letters, traditional characters, Japanese, and punctuation marks.”
Xie Chengyan heard this and got a headache. He scanned his iris to unlock the equipment and then handed it over to Fang Jingxing, allowing him to look.
Fang Jingxing accepted it and put it on. After entering, what he first saw was Xie Chengyan’s assassin account, his default log-in. He returned to the main interface and looked through the records inside. Very quickly, he found the closed beta symbol and hastily opened it, where a single strip of information laid.
{xu-5cc靉の！, Seal Master, Level 53.
He took off the eyeglasses and looked at Xie Chengyan, who was waiting for the results. His eyes shined. “It’s him.”
⬖ ⬩F⬩L⬩Y⬩ ⬗
The author has something to say:
Next chapter will enter V. Hand disabled, so tomorrow, please treat the chapter as a placeholder to enter V. The day after tomorrow, even if we don’t see each other, don’t give up and leave~~
Thanking everyone for their overlord tickets and nutrient solutions, muah~~
Footnotes:
[1] neither salty nor light: a chengyu (four character saying/idiom) that means plain and ordinary with a ridiculing undertone; the salty/light reference is in reference to flavors in food (savory/light might make more sense)
[2] rainbow farts: lauding one’s idols using exaggerated expressions; over-the-top compliments fans needlessly heap on their idols
[3] following the compass and going with the set square: to follow the rules inflexibly
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thank you for translating (*˘︶˘*).｡*♡